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We saw the first prototypes of the Pro82+ and Modu82+ series at CES, and we eagerly awaited our samples since then. At the following CeBIT in March, Enermax showed these two new series again but still we waited for our samples. After returning from CeBIT, we finally found our batch of PSUs at our doorstep and we started testing right away.
It wasn't too long ago that Enermax introduced the Infiniti series, which performed well in our testing, so we were quite excited to see how Enermax would top that performance. We heard from Enermax that these two new series would have performance equal to the Infiniti but at a cheaper price point. We initially thought these new power supplies used the basic Infiniti design, but we were told that this is not the case.
Enermax wouldn't be Enermax if they didn't include some new technologies in a new series. We will examine today what improvements Enermax made and how they function. We look at both new series today; they are essentially the same internally but play a different role on the outside. As the name suggests, the Modu series comes with modular cables. The Pro series doesn't have modular cables, which is the only difference between it and the Modu series. Enermax was one of first companies to begin selling retail power supply several years ago. They are one of the oldest companies in this field, with several inventions to their credit during this time. According to the company, Enermax was the first to offer a colored power supply, and they were the first to provide an external fan speed controller. We don't know for sure if that's really true, and we can't say that colored PSUs is really that revolutionary, but Enermax does seem to be at the forefront of new PSU innovations, and they rank in the top five in terms of sales. Their trend of staying ahead in the market place continues, with some very competitive power supplies in their two new series.
Today we are going to test a new liquid-cooling solution from Swiftech and compare its performance against a powerful air cooler from Thermalright: SI-128. Let’s find out who the winner is from our detailed review !
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We would like to offer an unprecedented amount of card readers within the same roundup: 27 models including such manufacturers as Apacer, Transcend, SanDisk, Pretec, Vizo, Microsonic and many others. We will check out external and internal models’ performance with the following major types of media: Compact Flash; Secure Digital; SDHC; MMCplus and Memory Stick.
Corsair doesn't have to be introduced as a power supply brand any more, as they've made such a splash since first entering this market in 2006 with the modular cable HX series. In 2007, they introduced four more power supply models: The VX450 and VX550, followed by the TX650 and TX750. All of these have non-detachable cables. We reviewed the VX450 not long ago, and gave it two thumbs up: It's another high quality, quiet PSU made for Corsair, again, by Seasonic. Interestingly, the TX650 is also made by Seasonic, but the VX550 and TX750 are both made by Channel Well. It's not clear why different suppliers were used for these various models.
The TX650W reflects the escalating power trend among enthusiast computer users, driven mostly by power-hungry graphics cards. Its 650W rating is considered mid-range by extreme gamers today. Interestingly, Corsair's marketing makes a big deal about the unit's single 12V line, in contrast to so many other brands which tout multiple 12V lines. As with all the Corsair power supplies introduced in 2007, the TX650 is 80 Plus certified, which assures 80% or higher efficiency from 20% load on up to full power. The packaging is similar to the HX and VX series, with a classy, understated look. The TX750 differs visibly in that it has a 140mm fan instead of the other VX and TX models' more common 120mm fan.
Read more...Low profile PCs are thin encyclopedia sized computers that are great for spaced constrained environments. The downside, if 'compact' has a downside, is the computer chassis isn't very thick, so the height of the CPU heatsink is considerably restricted. Most heatsinks that ship with low profile PCs are your only option, any they're usually just adequate. After market heatsink companies haven't shown much interest in making quieter or higher performing low profile cooling systems, until very recently... The Japanese manufacturer Scythe has introduced a low profile, sub-70mm tall heatsink for Intel and AMD processors tailor made for low profile computers. If you've got a low profile PC and are looking for that extra cooling edge, this might be just what the doctor ordered.
The Scythe Shuriken (SCSK-1000) heatsink features copper heatpipes, high density stacked aluminum fins, a copper base and a low profile 12mm thick 100mm Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) fan. All that in a package that is 65mm tall.
Though compact, the Scythe Shuriken weighs in at 355 grams and features three 6mm diameter copper heatpipes. The fan is a little surprising because it is just so thin, I can't recall ever seeing a 12x100x100mm fan used on a heatsink before. The fan has 13 impeller blades, spins at 650-2200RPM and is rated for 31CFM. Springy wire clips are used to hold it in position, and I suppose if your computer has the room it could be substituted for a 25mm thick 100mm fan with little difficulty.
The Scythe Shuriken heatsink is compatible with Socket 478 & 775 Intel processors, and the entire AMD K8 processor family (754-to-AM2+).
The number one question Frostytech readers ask us is "what's the best silent heatsink?" Much of the time, readers find themselves asking us this question after they've built a media center PC using the standard type of heatsink one normally finds in local computer stores. Those heatsinks almost always prove too loud, or have a distracting whine that takes away from the benefits a home theatre PC affords.... or don't cool well enough.
If you need a silent heatsink, and I do mean silent, the Scythe Zipang (SCZP-1000) is the next best thing to a passive block of aluminum (the only truly silent option). Equipped with a 138mm wide fan that spins at a lazy 1000RPM, the Scythe Zipang heatsink stands a moderate 112mm tall with the bulk of its body elevated 55mm above the CPU for good motherboard clearance. The tightly packed aluminum cooling fins are stacked 145mm across, and the Zipang has no less than six 6mm diameter copper heatpipes threading through, and under its fins.
Scythe designed the 815 gram Zipang heatsink to work with all current Intel and AMD processors (775,478,939/AM2), so you can migrate from Intel to AMD or vise versa without having to buy another heatsink.
The fixed speed fan has 7 impeller blades and generates no more than 33 dBA according to Frostytech's real world sound measurements. To put that in perspective, a heatsink that clocks in with 35dBA noise in our test environment is whisper quiet. To hear the Scythe Zipang you have to lean in and hold your ear to the heatsink; that makes the Zipang a great option for media and home theatre PCs where low noise cooling is a must... assuming the wide-body cooler will fit.
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<p><a href="http://www.wdc.com/en/">Western Digital's</a> emphasis on recent product releases has been the consumer oriented <a href="http://www.wdc.com/en/products/greenpower/family.asp?language=en">GreenPower</a> family of <a title="reviewed" href="http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3161">products</a>. That all changed last month with the release of the Caviar SE16 320GB drives featuring their new 320GB per-platter technology. We <a title="previewed" href="http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3236">previewed</a> this drive and came away impressed by its excellent thermals, power management, and acoustics but depressed by performance that was not any better than previous generation drives featuring 166GB~200GB per-platter designs. We have an answer to our performance-induced depression but that will have to wait for page two.</p>
<p>The second drive from WD to utilize their new 320GB per-platter technology is the Caviar SE16 640GB <a title="WD6400AAKS" href="http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=394">WD6400AAKS</a>. This areal density places WD once again in competition with Samsung's F1 lineup featuring 334GB per-platter sizes with similar thermal, acoustic, and power envelope specifications. However, Western Digital decided to branch off in a new direction with a 640GB capacity instead of sticking with the tried and true 500GB and 750GB offerings from their competitors.</p>
<p>While the WD 640GB drive does not fit in with the industry-standard capacity sizes, we fully understand Western Digital's rationale behind this move. This allows WD to use economies of scale with their new 320GB per-platter design and allows a natural progression up to the 1TB~1.3TB level by simply increasing platter count for each logical step. Of course, unless you use sub-prime mortgage mathematics, three 320GB platters only equals 960GB of capacity. WD engineering told us they can easily stretch the areal density of the current platter design to get to the magical 1TB capacity to match their competitors and witness the marketing group smiling <em>(Editors Note - anyone in engineering knows just how difficult that can be)</em>.</p>
</span>Why Samsung did not follow this pattern and introduce a 668GB drive with two platters and four heads is beyond us as their 750GB drive is essentially the same drive as their 1TB offering featuring three platters and six heads, just with 252GB left to wither away. The 500GB F1 will use a two-platter design but leaves 168GB of wasted space that could easily be filled with family pictures or Flight Simulator X. However, no matter what marketing decision Samsung made in regards to the "my drive is bigger than your drive terminology", the simple fact is that their new F1 product offers seriously fast performance for the dollar. Speaking of dollars, the Samsung 750GB will set you back $139.99 and the WD 640GB about $129.99 as of today at <a title="newegg" href="http://www.newegg.com/">Newegg.</a> For the bean counters out there, that equates to around 18.6 cents per gigabyte for the Samsung drive and 20.3 cents per gigabyte for the WD drive.<span class="content">
<p>Our review samples arrived from WD just a few hours ago, so naturally we were curious to see how well this drive performed against recent arrivals from Samsung. After seeing the initial results, we thought it would be prudent to post early test results with this drive and provide a short synopsis of our experiences to date with Western Digital's latest product. We still do not have any new information on the Raptor product family. However, we will finally have new products from Seagate and Hitachi next week so we can finally complete this midrange roundup.</p>
<p>Let's take a quick look at a few key benchmarks and see how this drive compares to the Samsung F1 HD753LJ.</p>
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Noctua fans are already justifiably famous for low noise and long service, but the NF-P12 adds a number of innovations to move the design to new performance heights - and they say they have done it without compromising noise. These include a pressure-optimized Nine-Blade design, SC (Smooth Continuous) Drive to reduce torque variations, and a new SSO (Self-Stabilizing Oil-pressure) bearing for exceptional quietness and long-term stability.
Perhaps the most interesting innovation is the notches you see in the blades of the above fans. Noctua calls these Vortex Control Notches. These notches are "psychoacoustic optimizations", staggered to allow the fan to reduce noise levels from the fan.
All of these fan innovations have one real goal in mind: to run the NF-P12 fans faster without introducing more noise. In the end, such optimizations can skirt laws of physics but they can't really be broken. For improved air-cooling, you need to remove heat efficiently with a great heatsink design, but that heat must be dissipated with sufficient airflow.
Noctua believes their current top heatsink design, which we first saw on the NH-U12F, is as good as anything on the market. They have coupled that heatsink with the NF-P12 fan and they claim this combination will move them into serious competition at the top of our performance charts while still maintaining lowest noise. Does this work; has Noctua found a way to accomplish both highest performance and incredibly low noise? This review of the Noctua NH-U12P will find out if Noctua has accomplished the seemingly impossible.
Read more...Our today’s article will be devoted to two new processor coolers from the same category as Thermaltake Big Typhoon. We are going to introduce to you new solutions from XIGMATEK and Scythe and check out their performance on a new quad-core processor.
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We will talk about a mass liquid-cooling solution for processors and a CPU air-cooler from the same manufacturer. Will it be fair to compare such different cooling systems from the technological and pricing standpoint? Let’s give it a try!
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